Naval officer chooses discharge rather than go to Iraq (Watada case mentioned)

EVERETT -- Eleven years ago, Sabrina M. Weiner graduated as a valedictorian at Kamiak High School near Everett. She was a National Merit Scholar, aiming for a bright future after earning a Navy ROTC scholarship to Stanford University.

Two months ago, Weiner, 27, after seven years in the active and reserve duty during which she rose to the rank of lieutenant, forfeited her career.

In a rare instance involving a commissioned officer, Weiner was arrested and given a choice between a court-martial or less-than-honorable discharge after refusing to serve in Iraq.

Speaking publicly for the first time about it, Weiner says she was not against the war but the so-called "individual augmentee" program. In the past several years, that program has sent nearly 60,000 sailors from ships and bases to augment Army and Marine ground forces in Iraq and Afghanistan. "It is not an against-the-war argument but a people-accountability argument," Weiner says. "I was proud to say I was a Navy officer. My problem is the way they are using us as IAs. It minimizes the job and training we do for the Navy."

It cannibalizes the Navy -- and Air Force -- to cover up a shortage of Army and Marine troops to fight the wars, she argues.

For her convictions, she was thrown in jail, flown across the nation in shackles and threatened with court-martial. Today she is scraping by in Everett, living frugally, tutoring high school kids in math and is enrolled in graduate studies at the Alden March Bioethics Institute based at the Albany Medical College in New York.

"I'm not another Watada," she cautions, referring to the Fort Lewis Army active duty lieutenant, Ehren Watada. In 2006, Watada refused to accompany his Stryker Brigade to combat duty in Iraq, contending that the war is immoral and unconstitutional.

Unlike Watada, whose case remains active after moving from a military to a federal court last year, Weiner's was resolved within a month in February. And unlike the Army lieutenant, Weiner has not become an anti-war cause for Hollywood celebrities and peace activists.

Navy officials declined to discuss Weiner's case, saying they were unfamiliar with it.

According to the Navy Department, 7,063 active and 5,050 reserve sailors are serving as individual augmentees, not only in Iraq and Afghanistan but also in the Horn of Africa and other locations. They include 3,145 active-duty and reserve officers and more than 9,000 active-duty and reserve enlisted men and women. The Defense Department and top Navy officials have acknowledged that the policy has created hardships for sailors and their families. The Navy has altered the program after listening to complaints from sailors, and invites more input, though it says the program is needed and will remain in place for some time to come.

Assignments are voluntary and involuntary, and reviews from sailors are mixed. Active- and reserve-duty sailors, who declined to be named, cited problems with the program to the Seattle P-I. They included a ship driver from San Diego, a sailor from Eastern Washington and a Navy aviator.

The aviator contacted his congressman after he was involuntarily sent to serve with ground forces in Iraq only a few months after returning from a full deployment with his squadron flying support missions in the war zone.

The individual augmentee jobs typically include public works and reconstruction; training local forces in Afghanistan; medical care; protecting U.S. bases; interpreting laws, especially concerning contractor obligations; forging closer ties with communities in Afghanistan; handling detainees; and administrative work.

Weiner got a call before Christmas that she would be getting orders soon to be called up.

Weiner says her job in Iraq was to have been commerce officer, providing money to local Iraqi leaders.

That gave her pause, not only because she was not trained for the job, but also because she is of Japanese, Korean and Jewish ancestry.

"They were going to have me negotiate money transactions with Iraqi warlords. A woman of Jewish and East Asian descent to try to talk to men about money in a country where women aren't always allowed to handle money," Weiner says.

Weiner's record and fitness reports before she was called up to IA duty indicate anything but a shrinking violet. She had earned two overseas service ribbons, commendation and achievement medals and was part of a Meritorious Unit Commendation.

After graduating from Stanford in 2001, Weiner started her career aboard the amphibious assault ship USS Essex, a vessel second in size only to aircraft carriers and which transports Marine landing forces. She was serving overseas during the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks.

"Assigned to arduous sea duty ...," her commander wrote in one review. "Outstanding officer and Navy professional! On the fast track! Assign only to the most challenging jobs!"

She left active duty in August 2004, receiving high marks in her final evaluation in all categories but professional expertise.

By 2005, Weiner as a reservist worked as a research liaison officer at the prestigious Office of Naval Research. Her detachment was responsible for managing research in underwater unmanned vehicles and weaponry. She also served as the unit's public information officer. Her fitness reports continued to average "above standards" or "greatly exceeds standards." A commander called her "an excellent officer" and "a highly motivated self-starter."

Her last good report was November 2007, this time newly assigned to a joint service unit of the Selective Service System in New Orleans.

"She is most strongly recommended for promotion and greater responsibility in the Naval Reserve," her commander wrote.

She agonized over the policy and her own convictions, readiness and obligations as an officer. The job seemed to her a random call for a warm body.

"I was not afraid of dying; I was afraid of acting out of weakness," she said. "It would have been easier to just go along with it." Weiner was to report Jan. 28. She was depressed, and she tried to call local Navy lawyers for advice. "I was told they could do nothing because I'm a reservist" with her headquarters in New Orleans, she said.

She turned to GI Rights hotline, a nonprofit organization at www.objector.net that offers legal help to servicemen and women, especially to those refusing to go to war.

Weiner found a lawyer and filed a request for personal hardship, In a conference call, her commanding offer was angry at her, she said. "I never got to tell them why I was refusing to deploy," she said. He ordered her report to New Orleans.

Weiner said she refused to report while her request for exemption was in the pipeline. Counselors and lawyers seemed unfamiliar with how to handle officers refusing to report, having handled mostly Army enlisted personnel.

A Navy official tried to reach her at her parents' home. Weiner was told to report voluntarily or risk arrest and being transported in shackles.

"My dad said, 'We support you. They are trying to send you to an Army position in Iraq. I understand.' "

Weiner put her jobs and a graduate program in bioethics on hold. She said she was preparing in to pack for New Orleans on the night Everett police arrived at her door.

Weiner said she was booked and strip searched and did nothing to resist, and credits jail and military authorities who handled her arrest with "acting very professionally." Though friends and the GI Rights people knew of her situation, she wanted no action or protest. " I wanted to know what the Navy will do." Military police took over and escorted her in shackles, walking to help her conceal them and avoid attention through the airports from Seattle and in New Orleans. "The staff was kind and wonderful to me," she said.

She was flown to New Orleans on a Friday night, and the Navy was ready for her: Face detention, then a court-martial or accept an other-than-honorable discharge,

a separation from the service in a middle ground, ranking below honorable and general discharges but above bad conduct and dishonorable discharges.

Weiner said she mulled whether how much it might affect her later life. Wanting to teach and write after graduate school, she opted for the discharge. She was flown home the next day. Her final fitness report dated Feb. 20, 2008, sharply contrasts her earlier ones.

"Lt. Weiner's failure to report ...was counter to good order and discipline, negatively affected the command climate and represents a failure to live up to the Navy core values of honor, courage and commitment. Lt. Weiner effectively put her personal desires above the needs of the Navy team and the nation ...Lt. Weiner is most strongly recommended for separation from the Navy."

The episode still makes her emotional both in what she gave up and for the support she has received. Weiner feels she showed honor, courage, commitment. She wants to continue to serve her community, perhaps to take apply her studies in bioethics into ensuring the safety of the food we eat.

"I want people to know about IAs, but there's a good side," she says. "The Navy did the best it could. I have no hard feelings. We are there to serve -- we serve the constitution."

Your primary loyalty as an officer is not to the "Army" or the "Navy" or the "Air Force" or the "Marines". It is to the United States of America.

Well said and so very true. In previous wars I believe she would have had free room and board at Leavenworth for this stunt.

Many moons ago, while stationed at U.S. Naval Base Guantanamo, Cuba, I needed to med-evac a sailor that had gotten a metallic sliver embedded in his eyeball to the opthalmologic surgeons back in the U.S. I contact the Medical Service Corps Lieutenant j.g. on duty that day to arrange a med-evac flight.

I was informed that the sailor would leave GTMO the next day because it would take the Air Force that long to arrange to have a Nightingale fly to GTMO from some Air Force base somewhere near the Canadian border. A "Nightingale" was a friggin' DC-9.

Why, I asked, was he requesting an Air Force Nightingale to fly from the northern U.S. to Cuba to med-evac a single sailor when we had small aircraft at GTMO that could fly to Miami that same day.

"To save money", was his reply.

He explained that, if he requested an Air Force Nightingale, the money would come out of the Air Force budget but, if we sent our own small aircraft, the money would come out of GTMO's budget.

I replied that the money was not "Air Force" money or "Navy" money or "our" money. That money was "U.S. taxpayer" money and that he had a choice of either using our GTMO aircraft or having the issue of the boondoggle forwarded up the Chain of Command to get their written opinion on the matter after the fact.

The sailor flew to Miami on our aircraft that same day.

It’s good you pushed the issue, that sailor could have lost the eye.

An opthalmologist informed me years ago an eye can be lost within 24 hours with some types of metal that are lodged in the eye, copper being one I believe, when I had a fleck of chrome lodge in mine.

Your example is one that shows how some in the military don’t look at the overall picture.

‘It is to the United States of America.’

Try again.

There is no Oath to the USA. it is to the Constitution. If it was for the USA we would be subjective to the whims of the US policy either for the good or bad and ever changing.

Your Oath and allegiance, which I believe you have taken, is to the Constitution. Which requires you to support and defend it, not the USA.

Btw, I'm not defending her at all for missing movement, just laying out what I believe is most important.

If we had alot more people supporting the Constitution we wouldn’t have as many problems in this world.

‘It is to the United States of America.’

Try again. There is no Oath to the USA. it is to the Constitution.

It is to simply "to the Constitution", is it?

Really? "The Constitution", of what?

The Constitution of the Republic of Argentina?

The Constitution of the European Union?

The Constitution of the Iroquois Nations?

The Constitution of the State of Indiana?

The Constitution of the Benevolent Protective Order of Elks?

We can both play these silly word games.

You can't be loyal to the United States of America without loyalty to the Constitution of the United States of America.

‘You can’t be loyal to the United States of America without loyalty to the Constitution of the United States of America.’

Of course you can. It should happen all the time.

If, by your definition of "loyal to the United States of America", a U.S. citizen can be both loyal to the United States of America and disloyal to the Constitution of the United States of America, then your definition of "the United States of America" has a geographical basis instead of a Constitutional basis.

You can be loyal to the Const. which would be against the Gov’t in many terms.

Take Katrina, Military enters houses and takes weapons from Constitutionally protected Citizens. That is disloyal. That is against their Oath but following policy. Black and White.

See the problem? The Citizen is correct not the Gov't.

You can be loyal to the Const. which would be against the Gov’t in many terms. Take Katrina, Military enters houses and takes weapons from Constitutionally protected Citizens. That is disloyal. That is against their Oath but following policy. Black and White. See the problem? The Citizen is correct not the Gov't.

I did not say "loyal to the Government". I said "loyal to the United States of America". A "Government" acting unlawfully is outside the Constitution and is not synonymous with "the United States of America".

Lol. Outside the bounds of the Constitution? Hello FDR, JFK. The past 100 plus years. Enjoy the welfare, not enforcing the borders, etc. Wow. Not following the Const. has been the problem of the Republic.

So, you equate "being loyal to FDR" or "being loyal to JFK" as being "loyal to the Constituion" or "being loyal to the United States of America"?

The loyalty to a politician or that politician's policies and "loyalty to the United States" and "loyalty to the Constitution of the United States" not the same thing.

The Republic has a "problem"?

Of course it does. The Republic is populated by mere mortals and is therefore guaranteed to have problems.

jude24 wrote:
Yikes. You never, ever ever disobey an order. Not even the ones you think are stupid.

She got off light with a discharge. She’s lucky she didn’t get sent to Leavenworth.”-

Busting some rocks might not have helped her attitude, but I would feel better about her insipid , shallower than the surface tension of water ,treasonous, 2nd rate leftist mole, free education, treason!

The article tries to demonstrate how solid an officer she was by quoting her officer efficiency report. In part it said, “...Assign only to the most challenging jobs!”
...”

That particular rater was blind.

She was given a “challenging job,” being an augmentee, and she folded before she ever started.

Of course the military can assign you to ANYTHING. It’s a lot like an Army cook saying, “You can’t force me to fire a rifle; I’m a cook.”

“Doofus...fire that rifle or die when you’re overrun by the enemy.”

She might not have noticed, but the military is not the United Auto Workers Union.

Sounds to me like she just wanted a cushion job with no possibility of any danger what so ever, so then, why join the military, stay home and get married and have kids.

She's a Moonbat. It appears she used the assignment to Iraq as an excuse because she doesn't like the Iraqi war. Below are snippets from her blog:

Greetings from Dallas, TX! I am currently at the Veterans for Peace 2005 Convention, and what a time I have having!

I had the distinct honor of seeing off Cindy Sheehan, Gold Star Mother, as she headed off to Crawford to ask George Bush why her son is dead. She is going back tomorrow, and will stay there until she gets an answer, and the truth.

"Camp Casey Attacked by Cowardly Fanatic

A Bush Loyalist attacked the Cindy Sheehan camp, running over the memorial to the fallen in his truck (dragging a chain), knocking down and destroying 500 crosses.... "

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